Jazz Today

Poet and critic, Whitney Balliet reminds us that with
the advent of the tape recorder and the long-playing record, jazz, which is
the most evanescent of modern music, becomes a permanent part of our musical
library. A native of New York now in his twenty-eighth year, Mr. Balliett joined
the editorial staff of The New Yorker shortly after his graduation
from Cornell.

by Whitney Balliett

AMERICAN jazz is in a peculiar but encouraging position today. Loved all over
the world, it is still regarded as somewhat of a black sheep at home, even
though it has become a familiar fixture in our concert halls, on records, on
the radio, and in the movies during the past ten years. Among the archest of
the highbrows it is still deprecated; among the lower highbrows it is taken as
a kind of new bibelot to be trotted out for informed cocktail chatter. The
public at large, which once looked upon it, through no fault of its own, as a
dangerous aphrodisiac, or as some sort of mysterious African bongo-wongo music
that set its listeners to jumping and bumping like fleas in a box, now
knows--even if it has not made heroes of them--who Louis Armstrong, Duke
Ellington, Benny Goodman, and Gene Krupa are. And its appreciators in this
country and abroad have grown numerous enough and solid enough to be able to
articulate their feelings through several national and international jazz
clubs, and to support a variety of magazines here and in other countries
devoted to the interpretation and review of jazz.

But if jazz is in a sort of halfway house, in so far as the world is concerned,
the music itself is in a vigorous, sound condition. One reason for this
heartening fact is the recent revolution--called variously, kloop mop, re-bop,
bebop, and cool music--which jazz has successfully and fruitfully weathered;
and the other is the emergence and widespread use of the LP record, which, with
its fifteen to twenty minutes of uninterrupted playing time per side, presents
enlarged possibilities for capturing more live jazz, and for greater musical
experimentation on studio recording dates.

Up until six or seven years ago, when the tape recorder and the LP came into
wide use in this country, recorded jazz had been set in the strict
three-to-five minute mold of the 78 rpm 10- and 12-inch record. This was in a
sense crippling and prohibitive, for jazz is a fluid, inspirational music,
which, having stated its particular theme--whether it be in the form of
Dixieland, Swing, or bop--can grow and develop in direct ratio to the amount of
space for variations it is accorded.

The recording as a means of reproduction and preservation is far more vital to
an improvisational music like jazz than it is to, say, classical, band, or show
music. Every performance of a symphony or Sousa march is pretty much like the
last. But jazz is perishably ephemeral, elusive. When a jazz band plays a
number, the particular combination of sounds that emerge will be ones that have
never been heard before and will never be heard again unless, of course, those
sounds are recorded.

Because of this inherent peculiarity and because of the one-time lack of proper
on-the-spot facilities for recording live jazz, a good deal of wonderful music
has, regrettably, passed into thin air. I recall one night at the now defunct
Ken Club in Boston during the winter of '43 or '44 hearing Wild Bill Davison,
the trumpeter, launch into six consecutive choruses of "Body and Soul." It was
superb jazz, but I could not whistle a bar of it now.

With the tape recorder and the LP (for commercial reproduction), much of this
waste can be avoided. Live, off-the-cuff jazz--in night clubs, at jam sessions,
in the big ballrooms, and on the concert stage--can be brought conveniently
into the home. Jazz played under such conditions is often rough,
exhibitionistic, and mechanical, to be sure, but the occasional inspirational
heights prompted in the musicians by one another and by an appreciative
audience usually more than balance these flaws. (The now famous Benny Goodman
Carnegie Hall concert is a fine illustration of the immeasurable value of
recording live material. When the band was winding up the evening with its
famous "Sing, Sing, Sing," an unarranged-for piano solo by Jess Stacy was
slipped in near the end of the piece. It is one of the most remarkable jazz
piano solos ever played, and is certainly the best Stacy has ever put on
record.)

Live jazz was recorded as early as 1935, but for some reason it was not
considered feasible to reproduce it on 78 rpms for public consumption. This
precedent was first broken in 1945 by Norman Granz, who, as one of jazz's
liveliest aficionados, originated in the early forties the notion of taking on
tour for concert appearances a select group of musicians--an arrangement he has
called "Jazz at the Philharmonic." In 1944, unbeknownst to the participating
musicians, he recorded sections of a concert he was producing in Los Angeles.
They were released soon afterwards in a 12-inch 78 rpm album of three records,
and there were just two tunes--"Lady Be Good" and "How High the Moon"--each of
which covered three sides, or approximately fifteen minutes of playing time.
His experiment has proved a huge success, for he has released fifteen albums
since then, the last an entire concert on three 12-inch LPs, amounting to about
two hours of music. Other record companies have now followed suit, using the
advantageous expanded playing time of the LP, and the record stores are stocked
with live performances of all varieties and qualities, ranging from night club
stints to private jam sessions.

A brief mention of a few of these should give an idea of what is being done in
this area. In 1941, a jazz fan who happened to have a recording machine and
some acetate disks with him recorded two numbers--"Charlie's Choice" and
"Stompin' at the Savoy"--by the late inimitable guitarist Charlie Christian.
(These records, however, were not released for commercial consumption until the
late forties.) It was done in a small Harlem night club named Minton's, and
although the quality of the accompanying music was not high, Christian was
given generous solo space. Because the atmosphere was an intimate one--in which
he seemed to function best--the results are invaluable. Many
better-than-average jam sessions have been recorded, and four of the best have
been put out on four 10-inch LP's under the title of "jazz at Storyville"
(Storyville is a night club in the Copley Square Hotel in Boston), and feature
such musicians as Edmond Hall, Vic Dickenson, Pee Wee Russell, Dave Brubeck,
and Marian McPartland. One of the most recent and striking examples has been
issued on a l2-inch Columbia LP called "Harry James: One Night Stand." It was
recorded one night last year in New York by direct wire from Chicago where
James was playing at the Aragon Ballroom. The band, which was an excellent one,
sounds expansive and powerful, if somewhat strident in places. And the general
enthusiasm of the evening, in the musicians' responses both to one another and
to a warm audience, comes through in singular and persuasive fashion.

RECORDING jazz music in a studio is a far different proposition. In 1917, the
Original Dixieland Jazz Band, out of New Orleans, was the first jazz outfit
ever to be recorded. There are rumors that the legendary New Orleans cornetist,
Buddy Bolden, who ceased playing in 1907, was also recorded; but, if so, the
records have vanished. Since 1917, countless 78 rpm jazz records have been cut
in studios; but there have always been the same hobbling factors involved, some
of which will never be surmounted. Perhaps the most important obstacle was the
three-to-five minute time limit of one side of the 78 rpm record. What was to
be played had to be tailored to fit three minutes. And if, as sometimes
happened, a group of musicians were functioning particularly well together and
did not feel like stopping when the engineer gave the signal, they either had
to stop, or were simply cut off. In addition, the garish atmosphere of most
recording studios is not sympathetic to the relaxed conditions that jazz
requires. And finally, a jazz musician, like any creative artist, never knows
what he will be capable of at any given time.

The LP is the remedy for most of these ails, but strangely enough, the record
companies have been timid about using its greater time limits for studio
recording. Norman Granz has again, however, broken the proper ground. A little
while ago, he assembled in a studio ten of the best modern jazz a musicians
available (Charlie Shavers, Ben Webster, Charlie Parker, Benny Carter, Johnny
Hodges, Flip Phillips, Oscar Peterson, Barney Kessel, Ray Brown, and J. C.
Heard), and let them loose within the limits of two 12-inch LPs. Each side,
which runs to about sixteen or seventeen minutes of playing time, is devoted to
one number, except for one, which is a medley of tunes in solo form. The
results, although musically conventional, are very exciting on the whole. But
at the same time, these records show the inevitable pitfalls of the new long
recording: one feels, here and there, an unconscious lag, a feeling of slight
desperation on the musicians' part. Ten minutes have elapsed, and there are
still six or seven to go. The high spots, where inspiration has moved a man,
tighten things up, but they unravel fast when a fresh soloist, who may not have
felt in the swing of things that day comes along with a bagful of cliches.

The adjustment, therefore, from the accustomed time limits of the 78 rpm to the
LP is going to be a considerable one for jazz musicians, arrangers, and
composers. And this adjustment involves the listener as well, for there was
something tidy, easy, and often sufficient about the three minute record; in
listening to some of the long recordings, I have frequently found my attention
wandering.

Some musical experimentation has been done. A new Columbia l2-inch LP, called
"Ellington Uptown," presents the Duke's rejuvenated band playing three of his
standards in expanded form ("The Mooche," "Take the 'A' Train" and "Perdido"),
as well as a new arrangement featuring the sparkling drumming of Louis Bellson,
and a section from one of the Duke's new concert pieces, "Harlem Suite."
Unfortunately, this record struck me as a rehash, for only in "Perdido" do the
benefits of extra time come through in fresh and unpretentiously played solos
and section work. Elsewhere there are evidences of padding, staginess, and even
pompousness. The Duke, great as his stature is, must also think anew. The music
of Lennie Tristano, the exceptional blind pianist, is another possibility for
the longer recordings, for he has been working with Bachlike counterpoint, with
and without rhythm, and the fugue form. Another might be in Dixieland. Bob
Crosby's big band of the late thirties hinted at broader fields in their
12-inch 78 rpm "South Rampart Street Parade." Finally, there is now an
unequaled chance to get on record in expanded form some of jazz music's
greatest individual instrumentalists and singers. The irrepressible Granz has
done just that with four 12-inch LPs of the work of Oscar Peterson, the
pianist.

There, briefly, is the encouraging and pleasant picture which LP has made
possible for live and studio-recorded jazz. As for the music itself, the newest
of jazz's many forms, bebop, although it has been pronounced dead, is still
very much alive. It has, to a large extent, simply been absorbed into the main
stream of jazz. Big bands that found their success in the late swing era around
1940, such as those of Count Basie and Harry James, have written bop figures,
bop harmonics, and bop rhythms into their arrangements. Their soloists will,
nine out of ten times, use bop phrasing; that is, the grouping and number of
notes in one idea or musical sentence will be larger and more numerous than
they were in the typical swing or Dixieland phrasing.

Pure bebop, which can best be played by a small band, is still being practiced
in person and on records by some of the men--Bud Powell, Charlie Parker, Dizzy
Gillespie--who brought it to perfection in the mid-forties. A good many of the
younger apostles--with the exception of bright musicians like Dave Brubeck,
Gerry Mulligan, and George Wallington--have, however, exhausted themselves.
Their techniques were never equal to the music, which, with its longer melodic
lines, its atonality and weakened rhythms, can be exceedingly hard to execute,
let alone think out in that split second before delivery. As a result, they
imitated their elders apishly, and produced cliche after cliche.

But if many of the younger men are burned out, some of the musicians who became
prominent during the days of swing have broadened their styles by absorbing the
leavening and loosening qualities of bop, which are its best features. The work
of Red Norvo, the great vibraphonist, is an outstanding example of this. Norvo
came to the fore in the late thirties with a fine small swing band of his own.
Since then, his style has moved with the music by becoming increasingly supple
and exciting in its use of more complicated harmonics and rhythms. He has
played with consummate ease in the company of the greatest of the bop
musicians, and has recently recorded, on a couple of 12-inch LPs, some
first-rate modern trio sides, using a guitar and a string bass.

As I have mentioned, most of the surviving swing bands--Basie, Woody Herman,
Stan Kenton, Tommy Dorsey--have altered in varying degrees their arrangements
and have picked up young soloists whose playing has been influenced by bop.
Others have stuck to imitations of Glenn Miller or Claude Thornhill, or have
reverted to Dixielandish effects.

Most of the Dixielanders have remained true and firm. There is a more
adventurous group, which has chosen to play a Dixieland minus a good deal of
its curbing chunkiness. They are using longer melodic lines, different
harmonies in ensembles sometimes partly arranged, and, most notable of all, a
rhythm section that swings along on a steady four beats to the bar, the old
two-beat having been discarded. Yank Lawson and Bob Haggart, who are both
eminent alumni of Bob Crosby's Dixieland band, are the gentlemen who have done
this on four 10-inch LPs-- "Jelly Roll's Jazz," King Oliver's Jazz," "Blues on
the River," and "Ragtime Jamboree" (the three minute limit has been religiously
adhered to for each number, though). They have assembled a group of men who are
primarily swing musicians, although one, the pianist, Lou Stein has definite
overtones of bop in his playing. What they have done must ultimately be judged
by private taste, of course. But, undeniably, their music sounds fresh,
bumptious, and free wheeling. It has given, a new look to an honorable, earlier
form of jazz, which a few years back seemed to be playing itself round and
round through the museums of recorded jazz.

A word should be said here about the darkening moral climate of jazz today.
Jazz musicians have been accepted as respectable people only since their music
has become accepted. Perhaps this enforced social isolation, together with the
terrible hours, economic pressures, and the continual demands for fresh
creative invention, has been responsible for a condition that has,
unfortunately, been growing steadily worse, especially with the younger
musicians. Heavy drinking has always been a problem, and now dope addiction has
become alarmingly widespread. One can only hope that as the music continues to
develop, its creators will develop an equivalent emotional and moral
stability.

Live jazz is being played in limited quantities today, and much of the activity
in the jazz world is to be heard on records only. People do not seem willing,
with the high cost of living, to support night clubs and big ballrooms as they
did before and just after the Second World War. if this is so, the LP and the
tape recorder are inspiring things to have around.